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March 28, 2018

Jack Kornfield drew me here, to the class. His is the voice I can hear most clearly these days as I learn to listen to my own.

The class tech people released Week 3; I just started following, am on Week 1

We're asked to journal following the meditation practice, we're asked to use the same meditation for the week...this, following a talk by Jack or Trudy Goodman. Jack just called this meditation Awareness and asked us to listen. Since I was listening thru headphones to a meditation elsewhere, I noticed I could hear their sounds as well as my own: here, a clock ticking, computer hum, almost nothing else. The wind is calm. a treat. There, singing bowls, birds (faintly), his breath occasionally...

physically, I felt mostly relaxed. I noticed a tightness in my face - mouth. it is there often and reminds me of Mother. I hear/meet my judging self when I feel that. so I relaxed my mouth. and it recurred. And I'm still me sitting; I met me thinking; me judging; me mentally wandering... and I met compassion for myself in the letting go of thought & returning to Awareness. (Almost left this one out! LOL)

i noticed that I want to be in a space retreat like that, and that I also met my unworthiness in the sort of knee-jerk reaction to the costs of going to one. Costs = $$, esteem; unworthiness becoming visible; that I 'don't fit' in... I could do this all day, but I don't have to do that anymore. My self-compassion is growing... want to qualify that - won't.

i did not feel skeptical of the process; not uncomfortable or conflicted. I've done just enough meditation to understand the gifts a bit. I'm easier on myself, now. Not certain that this would be true if I were doing this class in a live group.

Listened to the meditation again as instructed. The listening one... I must say that it feels a little tricky to try listening to my environment when I must listen to the meditation online thru earbuds. Tends to inhibit my hearing! Today was easier in some ways, and more difficult in others. Mind wandered like crazy...small but special dinner party tonight -

in an hour! well, no wonder.

But/and I was gentler with myself; more content. I'm really enjoying this day. Looking forward to the meal; I forgot to eat lunch!!! :)

December 24, 2017

"My father he always say that the oil is already inside the student, already there from all time. The teacher only has a match and makes it light, and then the student isn’t a student anymore, just a friend, going the same way down the dark road but seeing now by himself.”

“You have to believe your own oil is there, though, or nobody can lights it.”

"The point of it was: Don’t make your own life in reaction to others. So maybe the whole trick of the spiritual search was “To thine own self be true.” Maybe the real work was just scraping off layer upon layer of conditioning, assumption, and imitation, and finding, somewhere in the depths, your actual face. Maybe that’s what Rinpoche meant by “you understand you’re not you.”

"he kept telling me how brave I’d been to go first, how he might have gone only on the child’s slide if I hadn’t been there, how he might not have gone down a second time after seeing how fast we went on the first. And so on. He had conquered, in a small way, his supposed fear of “high.” But I suspected then, and I suspect to this day, that it was all a trick. By the second run on the faster slide I realized that the proper technique involved a complete letting go, an abandoning of oneself to the fates, the skill of the waterslide engineers, and the conscientiousness of the county inspectors. A mindless, illogical trust. Was there no spirchal lesson there?"

all ― from "Lunch with Buddha" by Roland Merullo

I'm on Breakfast with Buddha, now, and will follow that with Dinner with...

All fiction of the 'spirchal' sort, my kind of reading material.

And I'm using Insight Timer now, some, too... but, as with other pet-jobs, I tend to veg on TV and too much food when I'm in someone else's house..

Merullo writes with wonderful skill and uses language in ways that delight me. That's a large part of the attraction in these little books.

I don't claim to be Christian, as he is, but he doesn't make those tenets the point of his stories.

December 02, 2017

I came over to the blog today, because I saw that $4.95 on the bank statement, and I don't use this much anymore, so I thought I'd just drop it...

I read the last post - in June last summer. Maybe this space has more value than I've noticed. And in any case, I don't want that last post to be the last post, you know?

I WAS sinking into a hole of depression back then. And fatigue. And it got so much worse.

What I didn't understand at the time, was that I was also sinking into a serious bout of anemia that, by late October, had me in a clinic for transfusions. I had NEVER experienced the kind of resurgence that the transfusion caused in my general health, and most surprising to me was how completely connected is my physical and mental health. The depression eased, and it became much simpler to use the tools I've learned to turn the depression away.

There have been tests and consultations and in early January, I will have a small laparoscopic surgery to correct the circumstances that have caused intermittent extreme anemia. It's lovely to have a real solution to the issue!

And I'll keep paying that $4.95 for awhile. I'm thinking that, in general, I'm so much better off to do my own ruminating here...

June 14, 2017

"And it is only such a mind that is the religious mind, not belonging to any organized, propagandist religion – it is only such a mind that can see what is the immeasurable. And such a mind is a light to itself.”

Excerpts from 5th Public Talk in Amsterdam, 1967 by Krishnamurti

"We have to educate ourselves to see the invisible costs of our actions, until our outer life is in harmony with our heart’s true values." (Kornfield)

'To be honorable in these times we need to extend a “moral inventory” to our way of life. (*) Is the way we are living—our work, our home, our finances, our travel, our level of consumption, our political and social participation—in harmony with our understanding of interconnection? In what direction does our care for the earth and our realization of interdependence ask that we move in our life? How might we change, not out of guilt but out of love? We begin our transformation by the very act of asking these questions."

I left out this sentence:

'The Buddhist Eightfold Path includes Right Thought, Right Action, Right Speech, Right Livelihood." Still Kornfield, i think

My head is full of questions. My heart is full of emotion with an emphasis on tears. It's not a bad set of circumstances... Just seems like a good day to put words on paper and see what happes.

So, a few weeks ago I decided to cut back on the 'inspirati..' "consciousness/spirituality" reading I was doing and pay more attention to what my voice has to say. That's tricky for me - is becoming easier for me - as I move away from .......good gravy!

I am so flustered with words now. So aware that they may be beautiful, but suffer from the fact that no 2 people hear them the same way. Anyway, ...my reading was adding to poor self-esteem because I was only noticing how far short I fall from the ideals that these writers talk about. J Kornfield is the only one I look at now, mostly, because he is very gentle.

One day it really dawned on me that I - the I with a name and a history,etc - was going to discorporate one of these days and I was surprised by the immense sadness that brought and that I'm feeling now.

While I yearn in many ways to feel truly connected to all life - see that in quotes - as all those writers point to...I realized that I would be like a drop of water in the ocean. And the thought of that consummate dilution before I've even come to understand WHAT I really am, seems unbearably sad..

And now I notice how much I really ENJOY this sort of angst, and the writing of it - the telling..

So, I'm giving thought to how I'm going to actually embrace the Who that is my egoic state with all the crazy shit, so that I can find the What - the heart, compassion, benevolence that is really all I want to exude... ... ....... :) while grasping for your attention, and hopefully some momentary concern. Because I'm sure that when I am out of your sight, either you are talking to each other about my bazaar behavior or 'speeches' or I do not cross your minds. How pathetic. Because I'm supposed to know better.

So, I do know better, I just don't DO better. Everything I hear says it is because I will not meditate - or create a meditation practice...like I don't really have a tai chi practice... I feel like a slug: a slow moving, lazy, undisciplined air breather who is using space and resources better served in any other way.

So I start stepping back. Gaining perspective. Looking at physics (sort of), astronomy, seeing the scope (as much as I can) of just where I live in this Universe.

And I start comparing and contrasting what I see with the stuff I've been reading/hearing including tai chi. On the one hand I see Expansion Space and Evolution and a Gazillion Planets and Giggabazillions of POSSI-FREAKING-BILITIES. And I simply can NOT believe that ANY thing I do or think or say or be makes the slightest difference anywhere, anywhen, or to anyone but me.

You know what I do NOT see when I step back and look broadly outward? I do not see duality. I do not see Good and Evil. I do not see Right and Wrong. I do NOT see even the possibility of personification in all of the Universe. No god. No devil.

So...If my life matters only to me - and why should it be otherwise - then it is only I who decides what is right and good for me. I set my standards. I decide if and when I lie, or manipulate, or love, or serve. I want my standards to be high. I want to feel - deeply and internally - that I live by them. I am discarding the habit-mind thoughts that I am such an abysmal failure at this life. I am embracing the thoughts (soon to be firm beliefs) that I am learning stuff everyday, and doing my best. My best is good enough. I'm good enough.

(I just doin'g feel like it right now - and my weirdness about words and energy these days, makes it scary to even write that.)

God I'm sick of me. And I'm 70 in two weeks. I'll be saying 71, of course, because the 70th year will actually be over.

I'm getting a tiny tattoo that day. A little infinity symbol line drawing on a finger. Have been thinking left ring... in brown

This Kornfield article was posted immediately under my 'status' of "I am confounded".

I think/believe/? that both of these sources contain truths about certain things that are mostly beyond my ken.

The 'worldly' stuff of the first links prompt me into a general depression that I would have been unable to alter in previous years. Depression is fairly normal and quite comfortable for me, so it is easy to stay there. I've also noticed that it is most often triggered, these days, because I have not kept myself off the freaking Facebook. What a cess pool that place has become. I am extremely grateful for what feels like progress to me, in that I can turn the depression off now, through music and the steps I take to be aware of and correct my course when the 'path' heads in that direction.

The Kornfield link (and many like it) hold/speak of values that I choose to adopt, though I have not chosen Buddhism or its ilk. I do want to be loving and kind and honest and helpful.

And even now, as I sit at this computer and try to decide how to express these feelings, I hear....

March 31, 2017

Like all of Jack Kornfield's stuff that I have read, this is excellent and 'right on', as they say.

But it brought up for me, that weird and fairly ferocious anger that I feel in traffic. And more and more, I can notice, breathe, and let go of it, laughing at myself as I move to the right lane and exhale...

But in this article, Kornfield is talking about present situation anger and how to deal with that. What happens to me in the car is not present stuff. I still don't know for sure what it is. It has to do with control and judgment, and a level of rage that is completely unrelated to cars, driving, or the traffic. I know that because I hear the words in my head, as I begin the internal dialogue that helps me get out of that anger at that time, most of the time. There is cussing, name-calling and screaming, and stamping the foot not on the gas pedal... not pretty. (No, I don't honk at people or flip them off or...)

I like to think it's getting better. and maybe it is... can't really tell, though.

I also like to think that I don't need to go after it and find out what it is, really. I like this thought A LOT!

There are some real, very old, reasons why the anger could be legitimate...back then... But, now, these traffic experiences are telling me that I have left some old shit unfinished, and I come in & out of various levels of concern for myself and my continued evolution. Currently, I'm doing very little spiritual reading or listening...think it's time to hear my OWN inner voice.I suspect she will speak to me on this subject one day.

March 29, 2017

"Thanks for expanding your thought. I can't quite grasp how any of those conditions would require that I relinquish my dignity. Is not the path thru the last moments of leaving this physical plane still the 'same' path, and therefore the right path (because it's mine & personal)? Oh! I just had a flash of personal insight...gotta go. But thanks. This has never happened to me online before... Thanks."

What struck me, like a flash, in the midst of writing this comment (above) on a post, is that I heard him the way I did so that I could notice that I - I have looked at old people in various distances from that 'window' and felt pity for them - which is me stripping them of dignity. In. My. Own. Heart.

And in the 'flash' I knew that those people lost nothing because I was only semi-conscious and had no spiritual maturity. Their dignity is internal, as is mine. So I needn't fear that I may become a drooling fool and no one will love me. It won't matter whether they do or they don't, or whether ...

Well...it was a cool flash. I won't lose it. It's a lot to grasp all at once.

I love my life.

Oh, Yeah!!

I just ordered new cards and had them write on it...Omnicrone! Wahoo!!

March 28, 2017

The Good The Bad, and the Ugly...

The Good:My current pet-sitting clients use the Green Chef home meal service and forgot to cut off the deliveries soon enough, so I inherited 3 meals to use for myself. Yay! Yippee! I've always wanted to know something about these services. The quality of food in this service is Very Good. Everything seems completely fresh; all is organic; and all is portioned out for easy prep and cooking. I've tried 2 of them so far, and both were very tasty. No complaints at all about flavor or ease. My clients are on a 2-person plan. There are several plans based on how you eat: Omnivore, Carnivore, Vegetarian, Vegan, Gluten-Free, & Paleo.

The Bad:This plan is NOT good for single people. There is way too much food for one, and (at least these 3) are not ingredients that will necessarily freeze well. Also, the company has NO plans suitable for singles, and NO plans that deliver fewer than 3 meals a week except for Families...and with those you're getting food for 4. NOT an option for me.

The Ugly:The Green Chef believes that their packaging is Eco-Friendly. They devote a whole page of their website to it. But they don't take into consideration where their customers might live. I've found plastic jars in 2 of the meals, and as many as 11 (yes, eleven) plastic bags in each...ALL of them UNrecyclable in my location, unless I want to drive 89 miles to Las Cruces. Now, that is really Ugly.

A Minor Miracle:

As I was cooking a bit ago, I reached for a 32 oz bottle of olive oil (almost full) that I proceeded to drop on the floor! The miracle? The bottle landed standing UP and did not break! Whew!

I got a small EVOO facial and a few spots on my clothes (still in my day-dress, doesn't matter a whit!), and probably much less than a 1/4 cup splashed on floor, cabinet door and stove. Actually, this is a fairly major miracle when I consider what might have been :)

I've considered emigration, but I think it is not currently possible to do so in a cross-species manner. I'm thinking maybe it would be better to be a mixed breed short hair with some Abyssinian showing. (had one like that; Gorgeous animal)

Is any one else embarrassed to be part of the only animal species hell-bent on killing each other, every other species ofanimals, as well as ourselves and the very planet?

I sort of thought I had it together...and don't get me wrong: in SO many ways, I do. I'm actually very happy....as long as I can NOT think about what we human animals are currently engaged in. Or, at least, when I do have to think of it; I think Human Extinction Event and then I feel better.

March 25, 2017

Facebook asks you that when you open your page. I started to tell 'them', but then I realized it was Facebook.

I'm winding up my 70th year. Feeling pretty good about it. Much has changed in me and in my home since Joel died.

But, somehow, today, I've gotten caught up in the madness that so many of us exhibit these days, evidenced by the divisiveness, bigotry, and political unrest of my personal end times. I'm scared. For the first time in years. Not that I will die. But that I'm not likely to die soon enough to avoid what looks like inevitable pain at the hands of the very people who were elected to 'take care of me'.

And I have pretty good circumstances compared to the 'average' person in this country, and certainly in the world. I can't imagine the plight of so many who will really suffer if our collective fears are realized. And that's another cause of fear...I realize that collective energy is extremely powerful, maybe even more so because it is so often a default. And my energy at this moment is joining that one. Yikes.

And how do you say, "Oh, GOD!" when there is no evidence, no faith, and only the tiniest of wishes.. I mean, WHAT do you say? Really. The normal string of cuss words just won't cut it, and I know lots of them.

I know my work is to stay out of the fear. and the corollaries of that...

February 10, 2017

I came over to Typepad today to downgrade this account to the basic free one, since I rarely write anymore, only to find that there IS NO free one, and I've been grandfathered (grandmothered?) in at $4.95. Cheapest rate as of now is $8.95. Wow. Guess I'll leave it for now.

It's funny in a way...I had a thought last night..seemed random..as I was walking into the bedroom. "I'm trying too hard."

Hmmm. I think that's right. I've still been 'trying' to be a good girl. Ridiculous! I'm nearly 70. I'm not a girl; I'm a woman - indeed, a Crone! And I'm not good or bad; I'm just here. So, it seems I listen to others in order to learn - imagine that! And what I might have learned in the past few months and heard last night is that I'm living in a way that is opposed to my highest thoughts and the things I've decided to believe. Things like "I am enough" and "there is no wrong path" and "peace is on the inside".

As of now, I'll be ignoring the monkey message that says I'm a disappointing Tai Chi student, and the ones that say "I know best" or "Do it my way". And the ones that say even worse shit that doesn't need repeating here...or anywhere ever again. I will begin the process of NOT preaching to my friends.I've gotta say, at this moment, I'd just as soon enter a convent that practices silence, and let someone else tell me what to do and where to be everyday. But since that won't be happening, I'll just take care of myself, and each day will do it a little better than I have done.

So, to update...Joel is still dead. I like my house. I'd like someone else to clean it. (LOL) I don't particularly like 'The Outdoors' (a relatively new revelation), I'm still lazy, but I think I'll turn it into an art form. And I am still undisciplined, though I may call that spontaneity from now on. I get lonesome sometimes, but never lonely. I talk to cats and several inanimate objects. And I'm just fine.

November 06, 2016

Joel's dead. Maxie's dead. Bearly went to live with the in-laws (sort of).The In-laws (aka best friends) are just barely past the crisis point of their own Huge medical issue; I've been pet-sitting in their house for over a month now. My Best Friend is entertaining a friend of hers who I do not like at all... just sayin'.., and I miss her.And my sweet nephew is living thru his own version of hell. His is manifesting as Bipolar Disorder, Anxiety, Major Depression, some acting-out that docs have called Psychosis, and the ending of his 7 year relationship. In and around all this stuff, I'm living thru the stages of my grief; learning stuff, still denying some, putting on weight, and thinking about setting some goals.

Quite a ride.

Just drove 1350 miles to Tulsa and back last Sunday-Tuesday. By. My. Self! That is big - HUGE. I've been wondering how I would get to some of my friends farther afield without my spouse and main driver since I succumbed to road-induced hypnosis and drove off the road many years ago. I won't be worrying about that anymore! :)

Also found out that all those years of coach training are still there and NOT wasted because I didn't start a business. Seems I listen pretty well. Mediate well. Diffuse drama. Talk straight. and Own my mistakes as soon as I see them.

His parents have brought my nephew, just today, to Lubbock where he may go into a residential program at a facility there. Not the worst idea..maybe the best. I like it that he is closer; that he won't go straight into one of his parents' houses. That he'll get some assessments and maybe some adjustments/changes to meds, etc. He's scared. So is everyone else who loves him. So am I.

But not too much. I feel a bit like I've found a way to make use of SO many things in my life that I have undervalued. My own depression and years of various talk therapists included..my Self, too. I feel useful. That is a good thing.

The aging part is interesting. I really appreciate the perspective that these years provide. I find I still have great stamina...in spite of being over twice as old as my nephew.

June 21, 2015

The Buddhists would have me accept suffering as a fact of this physical life, and then have me rise above it (without the arrogance of that phrase ), and meditate my way to a happy and calm center from which all my Right Actions will spring. (I must say that a couple of years in a cave are not entirely unattractive.)

Abraham says that life is supposed to be fun. I can assess my spiritual growth (in some fairly insignificant way) by noticing the levels I have traveled up the Emotional Scale. Anger, for example, being somewhat better than Rage, but not as good as Frustration. To be centered here, I must vibrate correctly...though they might take exception to the word correctly. There is much of Abraham's theories that pull me. It's known as the Law of Attraction.

The religion of my history is very fundamentally Christian. They want me to subscribe to a Scapegoat theory that I find extremely unpalatable; then I'm told, by Jesus, no less, that I can walk on water and raise dead people, and then I need only give them 10% of the fruit of my talents, the gifts with strings. I believe intellectually understand that I can do anything Jesus did, now.

Psychologists want me to delve into family history to determine who is to blame for my dysfunction. I've gone so far as to select and claim a few of their labels.

There is an Atheist point of view, too, but I class that as the antithesis all of the above. And I notice that the more recent the convert to any of these, the more zealous is her/his discussion of the subject.Most members of the groups, those more seasoned in the physical/mental/emotional energy used to believe in these theories in this physical Time/Space, seem to be more tolerant, if not actually accepting.

They all, as nearly as I can tell, want you to believe exactly what they believe, or you are Lost. Each group defines that differently, but they are certain that their way is the One True Right Way.

Just thinking out loud. I like pieces of all of these and more.... ...just don't care for all of any of them....

June 19, 2015

It's true there is plenty of drama (if you like it like I seem to) in our lives these couple of years.

But the things that are happening to us and to our bodies are less about the years and much more about the choices we made as we got here. and I'm thinking ...

fun)

would i have it any different now? would I wish it to be easier...yes, physically easier. And I make that happen or not depending on the choices I have made since I told my mother (erroneously, as it turned out) that I could take care of myself.

BTW: I now offer tips -

But would I have listened to a 'me' from the future? or a chance meeting at IHOP? or something. probably not.

(just and aside: there is no - not one - comfortable place to sit and read...or type on a computer! just saying)

What I'm pushing against right now, is how 'aging' is a condition now. As in, Yeah, I'm doing ok..I just have Aging, you know, and now they're telling me it might be terminal ! sigh...

It's in the language of the health professionals, too. Such a shame...I'm thinking.

I like the knowledge that I have the capacity to choose something different. I still lack faith in my ability to self-discipline. Doubt rears...

and I know I'm choosing when I choose not to change, ...yet.And then I chuckle, and go stir the leftover mac & cheese, and close this tonight and read my funny detective story. sweet dreams kiddies.

June 13, 2015

It is Ferocious. and Ferociousness ......and.......Angst...................and............Anger..................................and.........Stalling(? yes, probably..).................................................and........................................Drama... certainly...And All Mine.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

And the toothaches subsided, and then came back like a bad habit. This morning, I had two teeth removed and am on antibiotics, myself, now. And they leave a hole that will show. And I am even more vain than I knew.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~About the last thing that happened at AHC of Glendale was a meeting with a speech/cognition therapist. Part of the time all three of us were there. Then she sent me out for a bit while she & Joel did some tests. Then she had me come back. There are some definite issues with Joel's cognition. She is easily distracted; her short-term memory sucks; she can become mildly or moderately paranoid; and some of these symptoms may not go away. Some may. No way to know. Both of us miss Chris, the therapist.

She is back in the hospital, but set to go to another rehab as soon as the right wound vac equipment can be ordered and delivered. Perhaps tomorrow, Sunday, the 14th. Maybe Monday.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

So, I say I don't want guests and what do I get? Unannounced guests. As soon as Kathryn and Marcia heard that Joel had been readmitted to the hospital, they got in their little car and drove 500 miles to see us. Thankfully, they called me from Tucson so I had a couple of hours to settle into the realization that they were really almost here, and to get over the thoughts of the things they could have brought me had they only asked! (yes, I'm still me)

And also thankfully, they didn't call because I would have thought of a ton of reasons for them not to come. They stayed only two nights - in my bungalow. It worked! I wish I had had the camera in my hand when Joel saw them standing in the doorway of her room. Priceless.

It was wonderful. They fed me twice and filled the frig with yummy leftovers. We shared a few beers and lots of laughs and I didn't know how much I needed the sight of a familiar face until I saw theirs. They left again on Friday, seeing Joel again on the way out. So, in addition to taking care of our two dogs, they drove 1000 miles for us between Wednesday morning and Friday night. It was a perfect experience for me, and extremely generous of them. How can Thank You be enough for that?

June 06, 2015

...Joel just told me on the phone that she trusts only the professionals; I am not to instruct. She says she remembers the sessions when all three were there: Joel - PT or OT - Me; but she denies that I learned anything correctly. Yes, my 'feelers' got hurt; yes, I knew it already.

She is still refusing to call nurses. There has been a conversation about that EVERY day. every day since she got there... not just for her safety, they even prevailed upon the liability issue...and there she was telling me she planned to get up and go to the bathroom and get change clothes, and Hell, No she would not be calling anyone. She can take care of herself, thank you very much.

She can be on two (or more!) sides of an issue in the same conversation.

I let her hear me crying, thinking that might strike a chord. It did; the old one - during which she just gets mad, but claims it's because I'm just too emotional and she doesn't have to deal with my shit.

I'm thinking of not going up there at all tomorrow.

oh, and I just showered..after dark.

....in a low-rent hotel.. and I'm this me now, and Norman just didn't have the balls. Heh!

I've always been enamored - not right word - also not a relevant/important thought since it has escaped my mind entirely.

I LOVE this shit. The 'angst' and all... need a name for it.. Maybe Angstall... open to suggestions. :)

anyway...

It's dramatic; intense; emotional... things I love...had to take a few years of Holotropic Breathwork to get the emotion OUT, and learn to be ok with that. And now I'm a big advocate for its value.

and Powerful & empowering. Like F YOU, (overwhelm, traffic, dementia, what EVER you decide to throw at me)...including Joel's apparent conviction that I am abandoning her to horrible torture.

it's very ventilating...head & heart are always clearer afterwards. I can get tad prideful about that, but it's a phase.

and it's MINE. It lets me know that the load is too heavy (in that moment); it's calling my attention to a better and different reason to treat myself better. It's my voice. it belongs to no one else.

So all in all 'school' is fine. I would like to be able to carve out a few days of absolute solitude...but so far, I don't see a reasonable way to that that is just not more self-ISH than I can manage right now.

June 05, 2015

I'm in one of those pissy moods right now. You know, where I want to crawl up into someone's lap and suck my thumb and hear, "there there, dear, it will be alright, you were such a good girl. But, NOO_oo! I've spent some energy working on consciousness, and ...damn!

It's getting really hard to properly enjoy a pity party. I want the lap and I want to be a conscious person. sometimes, it's a hard choice is all I'm saying. At this moment I choose the lap, so here I am, in yours. ...exhale.. ..........just rambling thoughts now

So I heard last night on a video, Esther/Abraham/Hicks say that 'negative' emotions are guidance,too.

I think my body is hollering one thing, my heart something else, and that 'ego'...it's just more voices.

one of them says you can get off the hook because you're old! 68 this month. But I don't know what people mean when they deny that age is a number. it is not a condition.

my thoughts fly so fast in my head I can not get them out of my hands. fingers flail.

I'm glad I can still feel with this intensity; and sometimes nervous that real consciousness requires that i smooth out the extremes.

and she is not remembering a lot of stuff. and that is scary..scarier than I knew and I continue to be my version of freaking conscious!, and sometimes it pisses me off, and sometimes it breaks my heart and I want.. i want i i i iiiyiyiyiyy ... myself and ...ultimately

The cacophony of all the voices and the environmental general NOISE

I've gotta go shut up, but first (lol) the constancy and variety of the voices, often overlaid with music,,anyway it makes me wonder if I'm not on my way to half crazy myself. (one voice even says, "God, help me"... )

DAMN. this. I will have to change some more behaviors/aspects/traits/who knows what-all. hasn't that EVER pissed you off?

June 02, 2015

Don't come.Two have wanted to: one to drive down from Sedona (found out who ratted us out), then the one who wanted to 'come by for her Kate/Joel fix' on the way from Austin to Colorado. Just a tad out of her way...

I'm not sure what that's about. I do know this trip is using a bunch of energy, and I don't seem to have much left for thoughts of entertaining. Even cancelled out on a guy an East Coast friend tried to set up. Strangers at the grocery store and the occasional restaurant server is all I want for now.

Joel doesn't even get it that she is not coming to my little bungalow for awhile. Rehab should start today or tomorrow, hopefully. I think she will like it there; hope she will. There will be TONS more social contact for her there, and people who won't take no for an answer about the therapy.

She's trying her NO at the hospital; yesterday was the first time that I saw her NOT get away with it. Granted, it's tricky to walk with fluid running down your leg or wound vac appliances hanging from your groin. And the last two days, she has done little but sleep. Yesterday, nurse Tony had to stand over her to get her to take some of her pills. In the evening, he mixed a couple of them into her pudding to help get them down. She'd rather not open her eyes at all...But that is mostly, we think, because her system is totally backed up on the 'solids' side...first water retention, now this. They were getting down to some serious high-powered meds when I left last night. Hope it worked; hope I missed it! :)

Also granted, her body has been through a lot. Healing takes time. But using energy begets energy, and she just doesn't want to. I don't understand it. Other than as another part of her nature to sit. And we can forget about MY suggesting that she move. She is still perfectly capable of making her 'looks-that-speak-volumes'. If I say it, it won't be happening.

I'm a little worried that she is beginning to feel that all this living is just not worth the effort. I wouldn't say that anywhere but here...but I need it out of my head/heart, so you get it here.

Still running. Hope to catch myself one of these evenings.......and that's not to say I'm totally avoiding ALL my work, as you may have read here...

anyway...her sister just called me and now it's time to get showered and up to the hospital... TTFN

May 29, 2015

This trip is very little like I expected and exactly like I expected and I'm missing/running from part of the trip...maybe.

I just read the last couple of posts while I had breakfast - scrambled eggs and cheese. I've got a toothache (getting much better) but have been eating eggs and soups and mashed potatoes for 3 days. Really tired of that menu. :) Happy it's been easy to find/make. Mayo always has at least one soup on the menu, and their food is very good.

What I've been running from is the opportunities for meditation that exist in my little bungalow. From the moment I leave this place in the morning I'm bombarded with noise, constantly, until I return here in the evening. The quiet is WAY more valuable to me than I ever knew. Living in a city will be a challenge...though one we may undertake when we get the house sold.

(BTW: I asked a respiration therapist about the differences between Joel's breathing here and at 7000 ft. They won't predict, of course, but she did say that there is a test that can be done as part of Joel's rehab that will simulate high altitude and give us an idea. Who knew?!

Several nights I've been getting home as late as 8:30 or 9:00. By the time I have some food, and clean something, it's already late... So I typically switch to a book...another distraction, rather than just sitting down and contemplating my navel. It's a switch-off between total escape into a good mystery or a lighter version of spiritual reading: Esther Hicks' kids' series about Sara, or David Michie's The Art of Purring.

I had/have/could have a chance to spend time with a friend of a friend who is a psychic, animal communicator, healer, medium, and massage therapist. But I've put him off twice. First, he wants me to drive to him...and I don't fancy unnecessary driving. Just the commute home is half an hour. And, secondly, he's a he, and about 25 years younger, and all those things I just mentioned. All of which I could probably use, but none of which I really 'get' (except the massage, of course).

It seemed intriguing at first; now I'm nervous about it, uncertain, and a tad not ready. All I can really do right now is to follow my gut and let it go..and him go...

And I'm going to say, just this one time - in this blog where I think I am safe, that I'm fearful of our cash flow situation now, and for this year. We're using the savings to keep me here with Joel. While we have awesome insurance and ALL of her costs are covered by Medicare and insurance, mine are not. They are deductible next year, but are out-of-pocket right now. Also, Texas is underwater, so the cotton crops are in jeopardy. If the planting is not done by June 5th, crop insurance won't cover anything, and that seems nigh on to impossible to accomplish. There has, maybe, been no time when meditation could be more valuable to me - and no time that it has felt harder to do. Michie's cat is telling me best... known as HHC, she is His Holiness's the Dahli Lama's Cat... :)

And still I run. Jim's voice is in my head a lot! and I wish... but wishing doesn't make it so. and while I am good at physically hard stuff, I'm not good at spiritually hard stuff. Not a fun realization..

And here I go again into tears. I'm seeing now, that despite everything I THOUGHT I had learned, my self esteem still sucks BIG TIME. I can't seem to get myself high enough on my own list of priorities. One moment I congratulate myself on noticing that, and the next, I chide myself for what seems like so much wasted time.

And how on earth did it get to be 9:30 and I still haven't showered... gotta to be me...best one I can access today.